Improving Production Efficiency, Meat Quality

U.S. consumers love beef.

Source: The Prairie Star; By Sharon Durham | Mar 28, 2011

U.S. consumers love beef. We eat an average of about 63 lbs. of beef/person each year.

Producing enough cattle to meet that demand requires efficiency and innovation. Agricultural Research Service scientists at the Fort Keogh Livestock and Range Research Laboratory (LARRL) in Miles City, MT, are conducting studies designed to make cattle production more efficient and to provide better beef products for consumers.

Attaining those goals has led to strategies and technologies for reducing the cost of beef production, including more efficient nutrient use and improved reproductive performance.

Reducing production costs hinges on maintaining high rates of reproductive success while reducing use of harvested feeds. A common problem that U.S. cow-calf producers face is low re-breeding performance among 2- and 3-year-old cows.